Self Love and the Woman

The other day I was reading about  a sort of survey of men about top ten things they wish women would understand about them. Number one was, that if a woman compliments us, we take it really seriously. In short, men believe what women say and really take it to heart. Usually in a positive way if praise is communicated, but, it seems to follow, that they also take criticism too much to heart and then start avoiding the woman who told them things about themselves which were less than pleasant. Even the indication from a woman that she is unhappy is enough to make the man shrink away, when perhaps she is relating something which she feels generally and he isn't its cause. 

Men are of course, used to the image of the loving mother since childhood and a lot of their sense of well being is related to how much the woman in their life loves/admires them. They are used to a lot of love by the mother, and their self love is well fed and intact. Men have the whole society centre around theorems they have set for themselves and women, and for them, not much has changed for Eons, till the woman changed and wanted to do something else apart from being with them. 

Enter the modern woman. Under pressure all the time. Striving for perfection all the time. She just HAS to be beautiful, thin, attractive, smart, funny, entertainment, sexy, a caregiver, emancipated, great mother, having a thriving career, hooking/ keeping a great husband/partner, great homemaker, party thrower, religious n dutiful as well as able to look great in naughty nightwear, the list of accomplishments she is striving for seems endless. Perhaps it is. She is pushed in opposite directions. Even if she achieves all that she strives for, she is usually exhausted with the effort. and sometimes not as much fun to be around as a woman who just takes things as they come and doesn't push herself too much. 

But a woman does not have self love fed by the parents from the start . Hers used to be an upbringing about how to please others. Not anymore. Even then she is often worried about how much she is liked, especially by men, how much people in her life value her, did the person who gave another woman a smile, give her one or not? an often, even when she receives compliments, she disbelieves half of it, and is insecure about retaining the level of attention that she has seemed in her mind , to secure. The traditional woman was content to excel in the traditional arts like looks, home, cooking, mothering, and the erotic ones( that was for bad girls), but the modern woman finds herself competing in more and more fields to be more attractive to men. She finds herself competing with her rivals now in having a career, being more altruistic, independent etc.etc etc. Just to impress men who will just not be impressed anymore. Perhaps she is wrong. All that he wants is only to be loved, admired, accepted and taken care of. And mostly left alone to do what he likes. Can a woman love herself ? Only in the reflection of her beloved's eyes. Perhaps they will not like to say, it, but that is what the men also feel.

Every mark but the mark of shame

I was reading Faiz s poetry the other day....and a favorite verse struck my heart. Har daagh hai is dil men bajuz daagh e nadamat, which translates roughly as my heart has every mark and wound, but these do not include the blemish of shame or remorse. It is true that as you go along the path of your life, if you have done things with good faith and what you thought was right, you have no cause to be ashamed or to have remorse. However people judge you or try to find fault with you, if you know in your heart that you tried to do the right thing, you should take succour in the thought that you have done nothing wrong. Allah is, of course, aware of what is in anyone's heart and weighs your action accordingly. But remorse is, as Faiz said, actually a blemish in a heart. if one has done something wrong and is ashamed of it, it forever resides in your heart as a dark mark, a blemish, a reminder of what you did wrong. It makes your heart imperfect, tainted, not pure and whole. But if you know it in your heart that your actions were driven by good intention, faith and love, however somebody's actions hurt and disfigure you for life, physically and emotionally, your heart remains pure, whole and perfect. It is beautiful because its true. There is nothing more beautiful in this world than the truth.

Many times people wonder, myself included, when somebody lets you down, is it my fault? Did  I deserve this because i was foolish enough to put my trust in somebody's words?  Was there something wrong with me that made that person behave unfairly, dishonorably, treacherously to me? Did I deserve this because i chose not to demean myself by treating them the same way? And why did it happen to me when I was sincere? You hear all sorts of excuses from people who let you down, and you think, maybe everybody in this world is right, I'm the only one who is wrong...wrong to expect love, wrong to expect sincerity, wrong to expect loyalty, in spirit if not in flesh, wrong to expect affection and support from the people that I love, why? They say that one expects thing from people which one would have done for them, and the difference in their response shows the difference in the feelings you have for them, and the feelings they have for you. 

But it is not your fault if somebody else behaves badly. If somebody is evil, it is not your fault. Everybody has a choice to act the way they want to. If they behave badly, it is only their fault and their behavior. Even if you do anything, a bad person will behave badly, there is nothing you can do to change it. The only thing you can do is to hold fast to your values and what you think is the right thing to do. Never let a bad person veer you away from it. 

When I look back at life, I know one thing. I did what i thought was the right thing to do. Loving someone is not a crime, cheating someone is. When one thinks one cannot get along with somebody faithfully, it is good to separate rather than cheat. Now mostly people don't do that, and somebody who doesn't want to live a lie, is condemned for trying to be with somebody who one can be happy with. If you are true to the one you love, if you are faithful while it lasts, there is no need for remorse. If somebody lets you down,it is not your fault. It is his fault. Perhaps they couldn't do as much as they would want to. Everybody has their limitations. It is not cause for any shame. Regardless of how our skewed society sees it, the blemish is in the heart of the one who is untrue.

The God Given Country

From the window of my office in the Pakistan Secretariat, a partial view is available. In the federal capital , the rumblings of national politics are palpable, but i am no VIP. I do not even like the lifestyle of a VIP. I am and like to be close to the ground, with my feet firmly planted on the ground. I dislike gunmen and protocol, one does not need to have an entourage to serve the country. But everywhere i see, I see perturbed faces, questions on the faces of the people in the Secretariat. They are thinking, what is going to happen? are we going to be able to come to work next week? Is the city safe anymore? 

The same questions are also on the minds of people of Islamabad. These are questions of personal safety, collective future, and political uncertainty. This is not the first challenge that this city has seen to its security. It has weathered many a storm. It has seen the Marriott bombing,the Laal Masjid debacle, the dharna of 2014, and many military takeovers. But the city, like the country, is resilient, and comes back again and again. However, the questions remain in the minds of all thinking people in the country. The limits of freedom are not breached yet, but  being able to get to work is my basic right, as well as freedom of movement, access to education, food and shelter. If anything curtails that, the State should act to protect me. However, the right to question its political leaders conduct is the right of every citizen of this country. We have salvaged democracy from the debris of toppling governments many a times. Democracy is valuable for us. Everybody is worried how we as a nation balance democratic rights of political parties as well as ordinary citizens. 

Peace is directly linked to prosperity , our country has seen much chaos, which has pushed it back by many years. Nobody wants that. Nobody should want that. In order to avert such happenings, politics should come to the fore. Politics is not only the art of the possible, but of myriad possibilities. Too rigid a stance from any side makes for a standoff, and the consequent damage to the nation. Hardline stances are good for political parties to rally forces together, but dialogue and a meaningful one at that, is the only way out to balance peace and stability in our country. It the responsibility of all sides to keep the dialogue going, and to resort to peaceful means to debate issues. It is the responsibility of the government most of all to keep the dialogue going. They have been elected to be responsible for the safety and stability of the country. It is a difficult balance that the government is treading. Lets hope for everybody's sake that they can make a go of it. Hopefully the God Given Country (Mumlikat e Khudadaad )will have divine help too, but sanity is required, first and foremost.

Role Reversal, ladies!

Last night I took a late flight from Islamabad to Lahore. Usually we see male pilots in the cockpit and air hostesses on the aisle. But last night I was pleasantly surprised to hear a female voice announcing from the cockpit that we are now landing and staff to take positions. The male flight attendants complied immediately. While this role reversal in the workplace is getting more and more common all over the world, it is still a bit uncomfortable in some parts of our society. Atleast in the urban areas, women in control are no longer a novelty. Although in the rural areas, women empowerment is still to be seen as an accepted reality, in urban areas, due to sheer financial compulsions, more and more girls are working and as a result, gaining independence and a stronger role in their families.

Whether financial independence necessarily translates into change in the societal roles for women, is still not a purity for independent, educated girls, or , for that matter, the uneducated but independent girls. Women in our society, whether independent or not, are still required to play the traditional roles that our society expects of them, and is used to. While the enforcement of these roles sometimes takes extreme forms like honor killing of a girl supporting her family, it usually takes milder forms like elders making sure that even if a female is working like a man in a man's world, she is supposed to take a supporting role in the house, that of the dutiful whatever she is in relation to her males, the companion, supporter, caregiver. Of course caregiving and nurturing, emotions, come naturally to a woman. But there are different qualities required to succeed professionally. As a working woman becomes more like men due to working in male dominated fields, she becomes less compatible in her roles at home as she brings these workplace qualities home to her personal relationships.

Naturally then, her relations with her family change. When we were growing up in the eighties and nineties, our female elders and some male relatives would call it that we have become outspoken, fast, headstrong and totally irreverent. This was only because girls who got educated and were given freedom gave voice to their opinion. This came as shock to elders and was disconcerting to say the least.

Some twenty years later, this is still the case. Men don't like to have independent ladies with minds of their own. Women are thought to be better if they are seen and not heard, they only applaud the thoughts of the men, and not at all is it ok if they disagree and worse, if they stick to their opinions. Unfortunately, men who are worth having usually are chauvinists, as naturally all confident meant think they are superior. So how do we manage? I guess reversing roles when we get out of houses, and then again when we get back in? This is a difficult balancing act. In the meanwhile, we keep on getting more and more space in the workplace. If more and more men get used to our changing roles, hopefully, we will have to do less role reversal at home and work.

Stumbling Blocks

In  life when we are all running towards our goals, individual and collective, we are in a lot of hurry to accomplish what we set out to do. For the sake of our goals we take chances, we make compromises, we take positions and of course we work hard . But some of us move faster than others, and the others get left behind. Why?

Of course this is nothing new in it, human beings have been grappling with external elements all the timeIn life when we are all running towards our goals, individual and collective, we are in a lot of hurry to accomplish what we set out to do. For the sake of our goals we take chances, we make compromises, we take positions and of course we work hard . But some of us move faster than others, and the others get left behind. Why? 

Of course fate and external circumstance play a great role in determining our trajectory in life, and for that we only have recourse to prayer and  a positive attitude towards life , a belief that good things will happen. But there are many internal reasons that determine how our life goes. For the sake of our own selves, it is important that we keep those factors in life under control that we CAN do something about.

One crucial but usually ignored factor in success is health. If we are in good health, and physically fit, our body can work more, take more stress and our mood remains ok, which keeps the temper down and allows us to make decisions without clouding our judgements. Regular healthy habits, avoidance of harmful substances and diet, all play their role in helping us live a better and more successful life for longer and absorbing the shocks and stresses that life is going to throw at us in any case. 

Another great factor is determination and self image. We all have a self image in our minds, who we want to be and who we are, and a faint map as to how to become who we want to become. It is our determination in life which makes us get there. Our self image can never match reality if we don't make efforts with determination to do so. Our will makes us change ourselves and our world to a large extent.

One factor is keeping your spirits and confidence level up. This is related to both your health and your experience in early life, but keeping a positive attitude and believing in yourself goes a long way  in keeping the verve alive in a person to work, make an effort, and to enjoy life. If you believe in yourself, only then do others believe in you.

Negativity and overt suspicion is a great stumbling block to progressing in life. Its not to say that these things don't exist, but one does well to ignore and work around these fears. They are only as real and matter only if you believe they exist.

Another hurdle is too much pride or insecurity, which leaves us unable to reach out to others and kills relationships. The inability to have successful relationships significantly reduces not only our ability to have a successful and happy life, but also affects our health as all the scientists say. Our own hangups should not stop us from giving and receiving happiness in life.

The biggest stumbling block is the inability to stand up for what is important to you, but also not being able to keep a balance between what you want and what others want. that balance is crucial for human beings, individually and collectively. 

We can't control our fate. But we can control our actions that many times determine fate. And of course, our faith can change fate.

Epiphany

It all started when the Kasur Incident broke last year. It was devastating to see children in our rural areas and towns being exposed to sexual assault and the being made to suffer humiliation and pay for this atrocity by being blackmailed by the perpetrators. I had long wanted to do social work, first getting a taste for it when i helped people during my time on field postings as a civil servant in the administration. I saw with my own eyes how weak our links are with the vulnerable groups in our society, how limited is the governments ability to reach out to them. I had toyed with working for poverty reduction, women empowerment, as these are subjects close to my heart. With this incident, I decided that children should be the ones i should work with. Call it fate, call it epiphany, but it dawned upon me that day that this is what I am meant to do.

My sensitivity to children began early, I was always too attached to them. I endured an unhappy marriage for twelve years, only for the sake of my children and their need to have a wholesome life, not one in splinters. When the end came, my heart broke, not for myself, but for my children. I wrote down on a piece of paper that i would never claim for their custody and gave it to their father, this is how much i wanted them not to go through any pain, not to have them have to choose between mother and father. I tried in the last four years since my divorce, to make the fall as easy for my kids as possible, to make them as happy as possible. In the last four years, me and their father have been able to provide them with all the love and affection, and the best life that we can, as divorced parents. I think this is what I am proudest of. That i never forgot my children, and never abandoned them. They are the reason that I go on, despite all sorts of difficulties.

After my divorce, I began looking at children more closely, thinking more of what they need to be happy, and to grow up as well rounded individuals. In our society, it is appalling how little we think of the physical security and mental well being of our children. We produce them mindlessly, we use and abuse them at will, but we don't do our duty towards them. And the most vulnerable are the homeless and orphan children.

With my decision, Panaah finally arrived. This is a small charity organization that I have started, which provides clothing, books, food, and education to children. We support their school fees, and try to fill in the gaps that exist in their daily requirements. Panaah means shelter, refuge, safety from harm. This is what i want to give, not only to my own children, but as many others as possible. I m doing it on a small scale which my donors , mostly private persons, and I can sustain with my other commitments. I work with existing orphanages and edhi centres. When I think of how much difference I can make with this, I tell myself that if i can make the life of even one child better than it was, and make them smile as I like to see my children smile, my efforts are worth it.

Wrinkles

Women are afraid of wrinkles. Not sure about men because they won't admit to so many things in any case, and tend to keep their fears under wraps.For women, it is the first sign they are aging, that they will not be as desirable, as attractive as they were in the effortless bloom of youth. The face is slowly wilting, drying, losing lustre and vitality. Men also think that a more youthful appearance and a tauter body is more attractive. Perhaps it is, in a basic, carnal way. But there is another dimension to attraction , which resides in the soul , the mind, and the heartWomen are afraid of wrinkles. Not sure about men because they won't admit to so many things in any case, and tend to keep their fears under wraps.For women, it is the first sign they are aging, that they will not be as desirable, as attractive as they were in the effortless bloom of youth. The face is slowly wilting, drying, losing lustre and vitality. Men also think that a more youthful appearance and a tauter body is more attractive. Perhaps it is, in a basic, carnal way. But there is another dimension to attraction , which resides in the soul , the mind, and the heart. Wrinkles do not affect it at all. 

Memories are embedded in wrinkles. Memories and experiences. The life that we have lived keeps writing on our face, laugh line by laugh line for happy times, wrinkles for cares and strings that we have felt and sustained. Like life, we can see wrinkles any way we want to, lines if we are thinking wistfully, laugh lines if we look back happily. Each feeling, each struggle, each ordeal is engraved on our face. The fights that we have won and lost, the ideals that we stood for, successfully or unsuccessfully, the life we have lived, sometimes happy,sometimes difficult, the people we have loved, adored, cherished and despised, felt envious of, tried to hurt, or those that hurt us. They leave their imprint. Why do we then try to hide these wrinkles? Why do we use creams, treatments, even botox to make them disappear? Why do we strive so hard to keep our faces looking like the clean slate of a baby's mind? We like to hide all the ravages of time and travail, and present to the world an innocent, untouched countenance, not sullied by experiences, not damaged by hurt. Fresh as ever and open to new experiences. perhaps that is why we hide wrinkles, because we do not want to appear like damaged goods that nobody would want. It is true, who would want to write on a slate already cramped with writing by others? We would have to wipe it clean, to start a new story on it. 

Those who look back on a life well lived, stages of life successfully passed, do not want to stay at a particular stage. They are done with it and have evolved. But those who feel they have not been able to make a success of some part of their life, they want to do it over, so they try to make themselves over too, to match their efforts. They do not deserve pity, it is just that they want to make a go of it. But nothing makes a person more attractive than ones who embrace their past life, wrinkles and all, and feels confident of themselves for the future also. If you have lived, your experiences just add to your mystique, they add depth to your personality. Embracing your past, whatever it was, engraved on your face as wrinkles, is the only way to face the future with confidence and poise. I look forward to wrinkles as they come with new feelings, new experiences, reflecting the life force that is never still.